Gaming Daily A-Z

I* joined PARPG to work on game interaction (controls and GUI). This decision was made after taking a look at some projects and talking with their members about what tasks are available. Now I want to tell you about the 'open source jobs' available out there. Radakan (RPG) is currently a solo project that uses the Python 3D engine Panda3D . Project lead Taldor would like help with the game design, GUI design, Writing (dialog & quests) and content creation (creating and converting models, managing the content pipeline). Warning: Radakan's website is currently down, best way to get in contact is irc.freenode.net#radakan . CubeCreate (FPS + Editor) will be a Lua-driven Sauerbraten-based engine. It could use some design help for editor accessibility improvements and thoughts on asset management (model/texture import) while the developers port to Lua. 0 AD (RTS) has a a well-compiled list of tasks. Megaglest (RTS) would like to have somebody find more players for the g...

Crystal Space 1.4 is out. Features include improved animations ("integrating vertex based animation with skeletal animation") and terrain ("improves rendering and handling of large outdoor areas"), OpenAL for sound and an internationalization plug-in. Engine screenshots are very informative. This is Panda3D by the way. Panda3D has a prettier website, it released version 1.7.0 and apparently has a web-plug in . The new version makes it easier to crash the computer, but also gives a performance boost - with the magic of ' pointer textures '. I have a little crush on Panda3D, because it gives access to 3D and audio with no complicated setting up through a scripting language (Python). On the other hand it requires 3D models to be in its own format and I find converting not very convenient. For example there have been problems importing animations into Radakan . OGRE mascot Ogre has a mascot , and it might even become freely licensed, somebody just needs to c...

There has been some activity in the most prominent free (as in freedom) software 3D role-playing games DungeonHack, jClassicRPG and Radakan. DungeonHack Green, water and village in DungeonHack [ more ] DungeonHack (DH) 0.10 has been released in form of win&lin 32bit biaries and a few commits later I was able to compile the game on my 64bit Arch Linux machine. It is the first release of DH that does not rely on non-free libraries . I played the game for the first time and I was positively surprised. Not only can I move around in the nice-looking (endless) landscape but also fight, cast magic, pick up items, enter houses and dungeons as well as talk to npcs. Physics also work (see barrels video below). On the downside: the current code is crash-happy and there is little content: In toto three houses, two dungeons, two enemy types, two items, one non-player character, one spell). Zombie roasting á la DH The next DH aim is to create a typical RPG village, add some inventory and stat...

These days there's a flurry of open source game development activity and I don't have time to blog or follow it closely, but here's a highlight of some of the most recent game developments. Teeworlds 0.5.0 is out. Everybody's favourite game about tea, where you have an entire world of tea bags and... wait, Q is whispering something to me... *listens* Oh, it's not about tea. The clue was the double-e apparently. Still, despite the disappointing news that there still isn't a game dedicated to my favourite beverage, Teeworlds 0.5.0 is the largest update to the game yet. New features to everybody[ who doesn't love OpenLieroX or another game I can't think of]'s favourite 2D deathmatch Free project include demo recording, a revamped server browser and in-game voting, as well as a a gazillion changes under the hood. There is also a new, shiny 16-player limit. FreeCol ! The game where you get to free Colin! Right?! No? Dammit.... ! Ooooh, the col i...

Levelhead I don't really know yet how to play Levelhead , but it has GPL -ed code and CC-BY-SA -ed art assets. This means it's good, right? Right? Well, I'll try to find out whether or not you can play it without having to cut a LCD display in mouth-sized pieces first. Sandbox co-operative map editing There's news regarding Sandbox , the child-friendly Sauerbraten-based 3D game/engine/editor. A completely freely licensed version is in the works. (Code and media.) So, hopefully we'll have a release soon, which will be includable in Debian for example. I'm very interested in this project, as it's obvious aim is to make content/game-creation a child's play! MonkeyWorld 3D MonkeyWorld 3D is a BSD License d scene editor for the jMonkeyEngine which I found through a thread on Radakan's forums . Radakan's WorldTool is currently frozen as the energy is now aimed towards the general MonkeyWorld 3D editor. Maybe even jClassicRPG will benefit from it....

Behold! The Uzebox! Uzebox is a retro and minimal game console, which supposedly will have an open architecture, driver and game soon. It is built for NES controllers and it's driver is written for NTSC. Take a look at this video to witness it's capabilities! PURITY It's now possible to play PURITY with pre-compiled maps! See this thread for instructions. Currently there is half a dozen of maps, on which you can roll around and figure out what the different attacks do. I found experimenting with the weapons very interesting and already developed some techniques for "get as fast as possible from this part of the map to that other part of the map." Also, if you're into minimalistic art, you'll find PURITY to be a tool for creating some sexy screenshots . Hm... three dee canvas... Radakan's team decided to use the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license for all of it's content. What joy! I'm still waiting for WorldTool 's next rel...

WorldTool r3 for Radakan Today I finally gave WorldTool (release 3) a try, which is a map editor for Radakan . To use the tool, one has to download it, extract it and then run java -Djava.library.path=. -jar WorldTool.jar . The tool allows you to create a map and to raise and lower the terrain and paint textures on it via brushes. You can place objects on it, which will automatically be at the correct height relative to the ground. It is fun to play around with (though not for too long, as the art asset is tiny and I don't know how to import additional media and because all I can do is make a map, not walk with a character on it or place items or monsters. - Mind you, the editor is in an early stage.) While using it, I got the thought that if such tools were developed enough to be able to produce content to truly enrich games, their ease of use would attract many potential contributers and could turn a player into a contributor. Even if the advanced features (like creating charac...

Radakan 's devs have decided to use the jME aka jMonkeyEngine , just like JCRPG does! Neat! I admit that I was expecting the project to evaporate, it just had too pretty a website and some team member was very concerned with picking the right wiki and installing a flash audio player on the site, while there was nothing of the game in sight. (I also was afraid the team would come up with some idea like " Hey, let's make our own 3D engine! Right? ") I'm glad I seem to be wrong, the first tech demo video has been uploaded. (I'm not sure if that's not just some engine-bundled terrain and model, but even if it is, what the hell! They're grappling with it! Enough proof of interest and engagement for me!) I just hope they won't let the plans for game story get in the development's way. But I might be wrong worrying about that - Radakan is a "single-player sandbox 3D RPG". Sounds like something that is free of the bug feature "storyl...

FIFE , the Fallout-like engine project, have made their first release of 2008, and put up a video of the tech demo that comes with the engine. Lots of new features, lots of progress, hopefully we'll see some exciting FIFE powered games coming along this year! D2X-XL is an spanky implementation of the engine for Descent 1/2, both very popular commercial games in their time. It adds lots of improvements, but the games themselves are proprietary and look a bit dated. So the D2X-XL guys are looking for people to contribute to a free D2X-XL media project . It's a good opportunity to create an awesome free game because the ships and designs from the Descent genre of games doesn't tend to be very complex, meaning it is easy to tackle on or two models without having to animate and skeletalize and add moles and skin pores and all the other daftness that seems to accompany character modelling lately. Back on topic, and they have some ships and textures and a few levels already,...

Like a time machine, I go back to the days when Free Gamer brought you new games and exciting updates, bound together with poetic abandon that would make a scholar proud. Open Football The coveted Free Three Dee football game, Open Football , continues to grow. Like Wembley , a spectacular scene that so many doubted would ever come to full fruition, the developers battle on in their audacious endeavour and, against all odds, the project plods forward at a steady pace. Cast your eyes upon the first screenshot to show more than one player on a pitch! Not much, say ye? Nay, but more than those before it, and so continues the goal of creating a football game that isn't rubbish to play. Oh and they show off Mac/Win versions in addition to the existing Linux screenshots. What ho? A foe? Or could it be an ambitious open source single player RPG project that looks like it will go somewhere? Radakan , brought to my attention via a wandering adventurer in the local tavern , but art...